"Bungie are a very unusual company," Kotick said during a talk at the America Merrill Lynch Media, Communications, and Entertainment conference (via CVG). "They're probably the last remaining high-quality independent developer... that has sort of has institutional skills and capabilities. And they're a real company."

And while Bungie is certainly good at what it does—as our review of Halo: Reach can attest—the list of other skilled indie developers is very long, including the likes of 2D Boy, 5th Cell, Capy Games, Gearbox, Level 5, Q-Games, Sucker Punch, Twisted Pixel, Valve and countless others.